In the Mourning
by Bittersweet Dances
Summary: She is as broken as a shattered china plate dropped on the ground and the flames consume her life so much that she dies inside. She is a phoenix - dying in a burst of flames and waking from the dead.


And she screams and she cries and she sobs and she breaks into a million little jagged pieces of not-glass because _she isn't made of glass _or any other fragile things because _she is not _a queenly court noble but the girl with the red-hair and green-eyes with the perpetual dirt on her face that was perhaps born in the wrong family.

Then she falls to the ground and pounds her hand not gripping the family shield with a grip _sotight_ that maybe it will somehow rend her hand into the dirt and she thinks she might be scaring the older man but right now in _thismoment_ nothing matters because _nothingisforever_ anymore. Promises are nothing and nothing is forever and this thought makes her want to believe that promises are forever but if they were she would be in their arms now and not being hauled away from the burning wreckage that has been her home – _herheaven_ – all her life.

_**You should have saved them.**_

And this girl is a tired, broken little thing to the jubilant king in his shiny gold armor that painfully reminds her of the jewelry her mother draped around the neck that this girl clung to like a lifeline that anchored her to reality when the nightmares came in torrents – only now when the nightmares come there's no lifeline or shield to hide behind as she smells the burning, the charred flesh, her nephew, her sister, _herlove_ as she ranranran away. The king is outwardly kind but the well-to-do man has no idea the horrors this girl just barely survived like a thread with flames licking at it, burning each tiny string one by one until there is only one tiny string holding her together. This man doesn't know her.

And then she meets him with his shining, hopeful eyes and hair the color of wheat who is almost like a beacon of light in the gloom of the war camp and she thinks maybe she likes this man who mouths off to mages and attempts humor even in the grasp of the Blight. And she feels a little guilty for liking this man so soon after her almost-promised died in her arms.

_**How could you forget him already?**_

The girl with the red hair and green eyes gasps for labored, pained breaths with each swell of her chest pulling the darkspawn arrow deeper into her body like her traitorous body is embracing the foreign object. She realizes belatedly that she is dying just like her parents and the two men she met not-so-long ago even though everything feels like such a lifetime ago. She can hear the screaming all around her and she isn't so sure who or what is screaming because just moments ago there should have been a reprieve for the tired army hundreds of meters below, but all she knows is that she is dying and she is so young and s o b r o k e n.

And the next thing she knows is she is lying somewhere soft and her chest doesn't ache quite so bad and there's shuffling around her. Her bright green eyes open and she sees the witch from the forest that scared her soso much but she didn't show it because she had to be the strong one for the men. Time ticks by sofast and before she knows it they are leaving the woods with another companion that may or may not help them at all and might just drive her further into the madness that already has her in a bone-crushing grip.

_**You're going insane.**_

The path is long and winding and she finds herself opening up ever-so-slightly to the man with the hopeful eyes and wheat-colored hair. She is speaking now, if only a little, as they leave the tiny village on the very brink of destruction with two more people in their harried, rag-tag group that she is afraid could replace her family in her life and this scares her more than anything. The chantry woman seems alright but maybe a little crazy like her because she says the Maker spoke to her and that can't be true, while the man who calls himself "Sten" seems quiet and like he's hurting inside like a knife is twisting his insides into knots, much like she feels all the time now ever since the flames devoured her.

It's when they are leaving that they meet a small family that seems like it's broken that they pause briefly to catch their breath after being quite-nearly chased out of the village by an angry mob. Two women live in the small house, one older and one younger with big brown eyes and hair the color of night, and she thinks maybe this girl is a mage, but since Alistair is an almost-templar, she doesn't say anything. Cold sweat breaks out on her forehead when they start asking questions, and the others glance nervously among themselves at what seems like a nervous breakdown from their silent leader, but they answer the questions about the massacre still painfully fresh in their minds reluctantly, and she sees the girl begin to break before her eyes.

_**She is going crazy, just like you.**_

She is torn from her dreams like two lovers rip each others' clothes from their bodies in the frenzy of passion. She sits ramrod straight, green eyes wide, chest heaving, tears in the pits of her eyes, the image of a horrible beast burned into the backs of her eyelids. She very nearly leaps to her feet when Alistair speaks, and she stares at him, wide-eyed. He speaks softly, quietly, as to not wake the other people in the surrounding vicinity, as he slowly, cautiously as if she were some wild animal about to attack at any given misstep, gives her some attempt at reassurance. Her breathing slows infinitesimally at his words, and her fingers unclench, though the full meaning of his words penetrates her mind like a burning arrow.

She doesn't just contend with reoccurring dreams of the darkspawn, or the archdemon speaking to the horde, or the Deep Roads, every single night she relives the night that her home burned down while she fled with a flaming halo as if she were a girl on fire, some spectral spirit from the Fade. And it drives her a little bit mad even when she wakes terrified and out-of-sorts and Alistair is always there, always watching her and never understanding.

_**No one will understand. They're all dead.**_

It is a long journey to their first destination – Redcliffe. She remember Redcliffe a little too vividly; she remembers visiting with her parents and running around the halls and meeting the Arl's brother and new wife and worst of all she remembers her parents lightheartedly chatting with the Arl and Arlessa over dinner while she squirmed in her seat in her itchy dress and tight corset even though there were no viable suitors in Redcliffe besides the young boy she happened upon once that had been locked in the cellar by accident.

A boy with hopeful eyes and wheat colored hair. The realization slaps her in the face just as the man turns to her to speak and suddenly her jaw locks and she remains silent all through his confessions of heritage and birthright and the only words she can even manage are: "You were locked in the cellar." And he smiles a beautiful smile that sends her heart jumping around her chest painfully because she knows this is all wrong because she isn't supposed to ever forget who she is supposed to be with right now but that would never happen because _he is deadhe is goneand he is never comingbacknever._

_**Never forget them.**_

Redcliffe is a nightmare that none of them could have expected. Leliana stares in shocked horror and Alistair is breaking and she is the only one that is used to this scene because she sees it every night in her dreams, people screaming, people crying, people running, people breaking. And in this madness she feels a strength that snaps her back into place and she for the first time since that night takes charge and acts with some semblance of normalcy.

Alistair watches her in some kind of awe as he sees the small broken flaming red haired girl somehow pull herself together to begin the long process of finding what is wrong and what the wardens can do because something must be their job even though no one has told her what being a warden entails because they're all deaddeaddead in the ground and it takes all she has to keep herself together when she speaks to the Bann because it's his family in that castle that leaks death because right then she sees the faces of her parents watching her leave before her very eyes and she runrunruns away.

_**You will never escape.**_

There is no blood in the battle because the dead can't bleed anymore than they already have in the process of dying the first time. She fights like she did when things were normal and she was fighting only as a formality and not as a lifeline until she sees a man fall to his knees, and then everything sinks in and suddenly this isn't just a formality anymore this is saving families from breaking like hers and she becomes a dancer. She flies through the battlefield with an ethereal grace that others pause to marvel at and in this rhythm of saving other families she makes peace with herself and doesn't crack once in the entire night.

And when the sun breaks over the old lake and the dead are dead again she finds herself shaking with exertion and the men watching her like she is some sort of angel sent from the Maker and she realizes _no one is dead_. And she's happy. She smiles timidly before ducking away to the docks where it's a bit more quiet and secluded so she can close her eyes for just a minute. Alistair follows her and thanks her profusely but she doesn't speak but her small smile is enough for him to know that she hears him if even just a little bit and he touches her softly on the shoulder before leaving her. And she closes her eyes.

_**Mourn for them even though they get to celebrate.**_

They run faster than she's ever run before for longer than she's ever run before because she can't tear the family of the Arl apart likes hers has been and so they must make it to the Circle in record time. They drink strange potions Morrigan makes from herbs to sustain themselves and before they are ready they break from the trees and the Circle tower is before them piercing the sky like a needle and the lake is still_toostill_ and she knows something is wrong before they even get in.

This is where they hear her laugh for the first time in all the irony of the situation when Sten bribes the templar with a cookie. She laughs heartily and it's a hoarse sound because her voice has been so scarcely used let alone her laugh and Alistair gives her an encouraging smile. And the boat carries them across the lake into the dark Tevinter needle where they know something evil is inside because the air is heavy and the lake is dark. And she knows this feeling because this is what it felt like to open her door that night and see the men coming for her _comingtokillher_.

_**They're coming.**_

The Circle is a nightmare and there is so much death _so much death_ and so many broken mages because friends and lovers and brothers and sisters are dying_dying_ and she can't do this can't do this can't do this. She draws up her steel wall though because in the face of this disaster she has no right to break because she isn't dying this time _not this time_. The demon preys upon every horror in her life and she knows she's about to burst into flames because the whispers approach ever so close until she sees Alistair and then she knows that there must be a way out because mages enter the Fade all of the time so they have to be able to get out, right?

And when they escape after she plunges her knife into the demon and after they kill the blood mage she is shaking violently and encircling herself with her arms and her knees tremble precariously until she feels a rush of energy and there is Wynne healing her with a sympathetic stare even though she doesn't know what could possibly be going through the girl's mind in front of her. And then there is a disturbing quiet that replaces the whirring of thoughts and images and whispers in her head and she feels like she can breathe again.

_**All you can do is keep breathing.**_

It is on another mad dash to Redcliffe with the company of mages that considerably slow their pace that she has a full conversation with Alistair for the first time. She speaks quietly and her words and sparse and vague, but it is a start. They stay away from sensitive subjects and stick to light ones – mostly about Alistair because she has no memory that isn't painful anymore because all her memories involve her family and her family is gonegonegone. She thinks maybe she gets on better with Sten because they are both largely silent but she feels like maybe she can speak now without having flames leap down her throat, burning, consuming.

In Redcliffe they save the poor boy. The Circle mages can't bring themselves to take him with them even though they should because the truth is he's probably safer with his mother than he is in the ravaged tower and she is inclined to agree. That night she is cornered by Alistair and his hopeful eyes and wheat colored hair and she can't say a word before she is in his arms in a tight embrace and she chokes a little as tears form in her eyes because his arms feel like her father's – safe and warm and comforting. And she thinks he knows what that small sound she made is because they tighten around her and her tears run silently down her face while she does her best to remain still as the salty water puts out the fire.

_**It burns and consumesconsumesconsumes.**_

They are on the road to Denerim when they are attacked. It is a full scale ambush and she thinks without every single one of them – Sten, Morrigan, Wynne, Leliana, and Alistair – they would have been killed because every single one of them contributes to the battle and she feels a small sense of belonging. In the end they have one prisoner lying motionless at their feet but his chest is rising in a steady rhythm and he awakens within minutes. The elf named Zevran confuses her because he is at their mercy after a failed assassination attempt to kill them and he is saying lewd things to her that do not fail to bring a red tint to her traitorous face and she can't bring herself to kill this man with so much life and she lets him live and he joins them.

It is not long before she learns that she will not regret Zevran's presence. Where Sten is a solid pillar of strength and Wynne always has a wise word and Leliana reminds them to believe in the Maker and Morrigan is a voice of reason – if a bit blunt – and Alistair is kind, Zevran is a constant source of laughter and she thinks that is maybe what they needed in this darkdark journey because she feels herself healing maybe just a little. And before she turns to go to sleep for the night Alistair touches her hand and gives her a warm smile and a wish for sweet dreams.

_**And that night the nightmares weakened.**_

The ocean in Denerim reminds her too much of home and it hurts but Zevran is there with a quick, witty comment and Alistair is there for a reassuring look and she takes a deep breath. She feels nervous being so close to the men that are their biggest enemies but they are as unremarkable as a lewd elf, a man with hopeful eyes and wheat colored hair, a wise mage, and a girl with flaming hair can be and they make it to the brother's home without incident. They tell Alistair to go see his sister while they deal with Brother Genitivi and he parts from the reluctantly and they enter the house.

Immediately, she knows something is wrong. She can smell and feel the death in the room and she stiffens as the apprentice gives them some information about a pub by the Circle tower. As she walks about the small house, she can't help but notice a frantic manner about the man when she moves too close to a doorway. She glances at Zevran once before she continues in that direction as if she didn't hear the man horror slaps her in the face because there is a _dead man_ in the room and in seconds there is another with Zevran's knife in his back and once again she is thankful that the assassin is there.

_**Death is all around you.**_

They are criss-crossing Ferelden it seems, because now the information from Genitivi's real apprentice's body leads them to a village in the mountains. Alistair is distraught as they find him in Denerim and later, with a huge breath, she gathers her wits about her and corners him in camp. The meeting of brother and sister was a disaster and he is hurt and she is reminded of Fergus who she has not seen in ages and all she can bring herself to do is give him the same comfort he gave her and wrap her arms around him.

They are already on the outskirts of the Brecilian Forest where the elves are supposed to be so they reluctantly abandon the search for the ashes temporarily and head straight into the heart of the forest like an arrow seeking its target. The elves are in the midst of a crisis with their kin dying slow deaths to a curse and she feels for the poor people because she can only imagine watching someone die slowly because her family at least was granted swift deaths. Her fists and clench and unclench nervously as the keeper speaks to them of the dangers they already face let alone facing a Blight full on and she doesn't even realize she's spoken until the keeper is thanking them for their kind offer of aid.

_**No one was there to help you.**_

They fight through the forest and she never expected that she would have to fight a tree but she does and it's nearly impossible to hurt the tree with her knives and it isn't until Morrigan lights her knives on fire with her magic that she starts to do damage and she feels so powerful because now she's in control of the fire and it isn't devouring her and it feels so _good_. But when the sylvan starts to pay attention to her when it had been focusing its attacks on Alistair she starts to feel an inkling of true fear and then it swipes at her and she's thrown back several meters and she feels the cracks in her ribs as she hits the ground. The pain radiates through her body as her vision blurs dangerously and her breaths grow labored. And then a cooling light covers her body as Wynne's healing magic takes over and she realizes the sylvan must be dead and it isn't long before she begins to move again. Alistair promptly picks her up from the ground with a lingering touch.

And by the time they're finished in the woods the keeper is dead and the werewolves are human again and she can't imagine what it would be like to be some kind of monster and the elves pledge their aid to the Grey Wardens and this is the first time she really feels like a real warden not just some washed out imitation and looking at Alistair she knows that he feels the same way. They leave the forest by nightfall and are on the road once more.

_**Run, run, run away.**_

She has good days and she has bad days. Traveling across all of Fereldan is time consuming and most of the time they spend camping outside and they spend a lot of time together and they learn each others' nuances. Morrigan prefers to stay secluded, Zevran flirts with everyone in the camp, Leliana likes to sing while she cooks, Alistair obsessively cleans everything, Sten stares, Wynne reads and scolds Zevran. She is the wild card in the group. Some days she is social enough, still quiet and reserved and vague, but she speaks to the members of the group enough for them to not worry about her – and then there are the days that she curls into herself and stares unseeingly ahead shaking and suppressing tears.

Those are the days that she reverts back to her cold dead shell of a body that is torn like a puzzle piece so she doesn't even fit anywhere and she's shattered like glass because she has learned that she is fragile and was better off a noblewoman and not a warrior that travels everywhere killing and having dreams plagued by darkspawn and dragons and flames and dying screams that now belong to elves and mages and men and not just her family. Those are the worst days and not even Alistair can bring her back to herself though he stays near her anyway whispering calming words even though he still has no idea what does this to her.

_**They will never understand.**_

The village of Haven is cold and dark and she decides quickly that it makes her nervous and on edge and it appears that the other people in her group feel the same. Sten intimidates the guard at the entrance to the village enough to let them into the confines of the village and she silently thanks the Maker that she didn't have to speak more than a few words because she doesn't think she could have done so without stuttering. They surreptitiously peak in a house and the blood spattered over the walls have her swaying in horror as she stumbles back a couple steps into Alistair's chest. She takes a deep breath and slams her steel wall into place and begins the long trudge up an incline that takes them to the village's chantry from which a strange chant emanates.

They attack without warning and she finds herself taking part in a slaughter and the thought almost makes her sick but she knows she will be killed if she makes herself that vulnerable so she clings tightly to her steel wall that hides her emotions so effectively that sometimes she can even convince herself she's okay.

_**You're not okay.**_

She manages to hold it together all through the journey through the ruins and even the killing of all the cultists and their leader and the awe and terror of seeing a high dragon so close, but the Guardian of the gauntlet breaks everything she has left in her. She left her mother and father behind and she should have stayed _sheshouldhaveprotectedthem_ like they always protected her but she ran_ran__**ran**_away like a coward, a deserter, and she knows that and loathes herself for it and she will never be okay ever again and she let these people almost replace those she lost in her heart and she can't do that not now not ever. She failed them.

Then she sees someone that couldn't be here. She screams for him and runs towards her father and passes straight through him and to the ground where she crumples in pain and despair and slams her fist into the ground. And then he speaks, the same voice that told her grand stories at night to help her sleep and just as always he gives her one last piece of fatherly advice and she screams for him when the apparition is gone and all that is left is the Cousland amulet and her memories rending her insides into tiny pieces over and over and over again.

_**You failed them.**_

They return to the bottom of the mountain where the rest of their little party is waiting for them with a pinch of ashes for the Arl and she immediately takes off into the trees by herself with her arms wrapped around herself to try and anchor herself to this world because she's lost all the anchors in her life and she's just a lost ship drifting along the ocean hopelessly lost. She shouldn't be surprised that Alistair followed her, but his hand on her shoulder still scares her and suddenly she finds herself falling to pieces in front of him, completely losing her powerful leader façade as the tears pour down her face and sobs wrack her body and she mourns her lost life for the first time since she has been unceremoniously tossed into the life of a Warden with no time to gain her bearings.

She doubles over with sobs and her fingers dig into her sides and Alistair takes her in his arms and she's suddenly recounting _everything_. All the pain and the nightmares and everything and he remains silent as the story spills out between the sobs that violently shake her body. Her knees give out but it doesn't matter because he's holding her so tight now that she doesn't fall to the ground like she expected but she doesn't care because _she misses them so much_ and seeing that apparition of her father was enough to shatter the fragile control she had maintained since leaving the Circle. Her green eyes are rimmed in red that matches her flame-red hair and she pounds her fist into Alistair's armor before she slackens in his arms and cries.

_**Mourn them.**_

It takes a long time for her to calm down and stem the flood of emotions but Alistair is there the entire time and she finds herself wrapping her arms around him in return, her heart beating rapidly against her chest – a heart that should have stopped months ago with her parents or in Ostagar or many times after that but the cruel Maker will not let her join her parents. _I love you._ She says abruptly and suddenly he is not holding her so tight anymore and pulling away and her tears start again and she feels herself breaking again. He stares into her eyes long and hard before leaning forward and touching her lips softly, carefully, as if she might shatter into a million pieces at the slightest touch.

He pulls back slowly, as if afraid that she might lose her weak grip on sanity at this sudden intimacy after months of remaining silent and reluctance to touch anyone and she realizes she is shaking and still crying but she doesn't care and she pulls his head back down to her, losing herself in him.

_**And she feels herself start to heal, one kiss at a time.**_

Alistair is her anchor. Every time she begins to slip away into a terrible dream world where everything is in flames and everyone is dead he pulls her back with whispered words and gentle touches and the camp can't help but watch this man bring their leader back to life after she has been dead for so long that they have never even seen her live. And that journey back to Redcliffe was a hurried but joyous trek as Alistair seems to raise the dead and she begins to respond more frequently and more vigorously to conversation attempts. She bonds with everyone in that camp even though every evening is spent at Alistair's side resting her head on his shoulder with his hand stroking her fire-red hair that is almost a mockery of her trauma.

Mere minutes after the administration of the ashes to the Arl he is awake and speaking and it is cause to celebrate. The entire town erupts into festivities and a feast is called in the castle and she finds it too much because it reminds her of the times she spent at this very castle when her life wasn't in fragments. She finds him in his room and stares at him with desperate green eyes and he is holding her within seconds and she knows that this could be the only chance they have. So when he kisses her she doesn't let him stop as his hands run up her sides and she reaches for the buckle at his trousers and he almost stops but she hushes him with a sharp word.

_**It is the first night the nightmares don't haunt her.**_

_My phoenix._ He calls her because she is the girl who died in a burst of flame and was reborn and she thinks that it is suiting, if nothing else. The blond dwarf has enchanted her knives with runes of fire and now the knives glow with the intensity of an all-consuming wildfire that dances around a battlefield in tune with her bittersweet waltz and she has become the girl who is on fire because her redred hair whips around her in step with her movements like a flickering flame and it is almost ironic because she is terrified of fire.

Orzammar is unsettling because she is not used to have a ceiling over her at all times and there is a political war raging and doesn't know who she is supposed to support. Alistair and Wynne believe in Harrowmont but Sten supports Bhelen and she is unsure because she needs a military ruler to take charge so they can receive help in the Blight but at the same time she doesn't want to doom the dwarves to oppression.

_**At least their ruler won't be dead.**_

The Deep Roads terrify every single one of them. The hum of the Blight resonates in her bones because there are _so many darkspawn_ and the sight of the Archdemon itself is enough to make her want to runrunrun back to the surface. The drunken dwarf they picked up leads them infallibly through the weaving tunnels until they have ventured so deep that they encounter a legion fighting dutifully to the death. She thinks this would not be such a bad place to go to her death.

His wife is mad and the Anvil is destroyed by the time they trudge back into the city in the midst of a political debate that is quickly turning violent and she painfully throws her support behind the leader who will be able to raise an army that will be able to fight the darkspawn with them much to Alistair's disdain but he remains silent because he knows that she is still healing and his anger would likely undo every step towards living that she has made on this long path to the dwarf kingdom and suddenly she knows that Alistair will be king.

_**And you will be forgotten.**_

They fight for the first time in Redcliffe just before they leave for Denerim to attend the landsmeet. She yells and he refuses and she spits out before she can stop herself: _I will be your queen._ And he falls silent and stares at her for a sly grin spreads across his face and he takes her by the waist and knows that she essentially agreed to marry him in the space of a single second and she thinks that her parents would like Alistair.

The Arl disapproves of the plan they have made for ruling but he does not outright oppose the plan so she begins marching to Denerim with a single rose threaded through her hair.

_**Love me.**_

_I'll __**kill**__ you for what you've done! _She screams in the cellar of his villa and the fight begins. She dances with the passion and fury of retribution and she fells the men one by one for justice and vengeance. Her friends have never seen her so angry but they understand and it is by her flaming blade he finally dies for his crimes and she closes her eyes and looks up and breathes easily for the first time in a long time. She pulls her knife from his chest, his blood seeping into the indentations on the knife that spell _justice._

Her joy is short-lived because she is clapped in chains and she is glad Alistair is not here because the capturing of their proposed king would throw a wrench into the plan and she thinks that maybe she might die now but at least she would see Howe in hell. She lay on her side with her head pillowed on her arm in the prison cell peacefully ignoring the jeers and taunts of the guards and maybe she is finally insane but at least now she is content in her insanity.

_**Revenge tastes like you only **_**sweeter**_**.**_

Alistair is king Alistair is king Alistair is king and the Landsmeet is overoverover and Anora is in prison and Loghain is dead and the nobles throw their support behind her _their queen_. She grips her father's amulet in her fingers and smiles and knows that he is at the Maker's side watching and is proud of his little girl who has set the world in flames. The ache in her chest still throbs painfully in their memory but she is better now – she is fine again.

They are awoken by panic in the Redcliffe estate because Redcliffe is under attack and she leaps out of bed leaving Alistair confused and half-asleep and she is taking charge and they are leaving Denerim in record time and rushing back to Redcliffe as quickly as a wild fire spreads over a grass plain and one night Zevran offers to pierce her ear and she smiles and finally gives in to the elf's insistence and she even manages to convince Alistair to get one too and she takes his hand and tells them that they _match_.

_**I'm not scared, now.**_

Redcliffe is relatively safe but they are leaving in the morning because Denerim is going to be attacked and the Archdemon will be there and there are only three wardens to possibly take the final blow and she hopes and prays that it will be Riordan but she knows she will not let Alistair do it because Fereldan needs its king. And death doesn't scare her anymore. She knows she will see her parents again and all the people that she watched die and maybe she will be loved or maybe she won't but it doesn't matter because she has lived a life more potent than many have in four times her years.

Morrigan makes a strange offer and she can't imagine the repercussions of an Old God child because wouldn't the darkspawn seek it like a beacon? And her stomach squirms at the thought Morrigan and Alistair…_herAlistair_ and she feels selfish but she can't let Morrigan do this and when she's left standing alone in her room and Morrigan is gone she begins to ask herself if she shouldn't have been selfish.

_**You made a mistake**_.

The battle is long and hard and they are fighting the Archdemon – her, Wynne, Leliana, and Alistair and she is already prepared for her death because she _isnot_ letting Alistair do this. The Archdemon swipes at her with its tail and she is thrown back and hits the ground _hardhardhard_ and she feels a wound open up on her head and the blood is soaking her hair and her vision is clearing as she sees him take a sword and run to the Archdemon. Her mouth opens in a strangled cry in protest just the sword is stabbed into the dragon's head and she feels her insides turn to dust. She is thrown back to the ground from the burst of light and when her vision clears she is broken.

She screams and runs to him and he _is still alive_ but only long enough for him to say three words and then he is gone_gone__**gone**_**.** And she is being consumed in flames and she's breaking like glass and pounding the ground in a fit of madness. She is screaming over and over again and tears are falling down her face and her thoughts are flying at a million miles a minute and Wynne and Leliana don't know what to do anymore.

_**This is all YOUR FAULT. YOU FAILED.**_

She won't let them touch his body and when they try to approach she lashes out with everything she has - using her nails as talons and kicking and screaming and they are too afraid to approach the girl mourning her love and she feels like she has just lost everything _again_. Her fingers clench his shirt because she has removed his armor because she wants to just _feelhimagain_. She is curled around him protectively because he is still warm and she can almost pretend he is only asleep but his chest isn't rising and his heart isn't beating and she wants to die with him if the Maker would just be merciful and crush her heart now. She is still bleeding and her red hair is soaked _redredred _blood and the world is spinning around her and the only thing in focus is his face.

_Pup._ A voice says and she looks up and sees her brother standing before her and she thinks maybe she is dead now and is seeing her dead brother but Wynne and Leliana are standing behind him and she knows that she isn't dead and Fergus isn't dead but she wants to be dead because the only person who matters _is_. He bends down and wraps his arms around her and picks her up and she curls into his chest and sobs into his shoulder as he carries her away_away_ from the tower.

_**YOU COULD HAVE SAVED HIM**_.

She doesn't attend the coronation. Anora is being made queen because she doesn't want to rule without _him_ and she won't leave the room with the bed that stills smells like him if only a little. People have come in and out to see her but she does not stir does not look at them does not speak and it takes Fergus telling her that they are having his funeral for her to move. Her older brother braids her hair like he used to and helps her dress but she refuses the gown and fumbles with clasps of her armor and the sheathes of her blades. He places a circlet around her head and she stares at him in silent horror before he tells her that she is the Hero of Ferelden and she stiffens because she is not a hero _he _is. He wraps his arm around her waist and leads her from the room for the first time in days.

She stands between her brother and Leliana who holds her hand as she lets her tears fall unhindered. The funeral is a joke. The things they say about him do not even scratch the surface of the man who died because he is not just a savior he is a miracle because he brought her back to life like a phoenix returns to life and she shakes violently and everyone is watching her break in front of their eyes.

_**My phoenix.**_

She run_run__**runs**_ away. She jumps on a ship with only her weapons, her armor, her father's necklace, and his rose and the ship takes her farfar away from here where there are only memories and flames and where she is the Hero of Ferelden and she is the girl who is on fire but she feels like no one because she has failed everyone. She gets off the ship in Antiva and she remembers Zevran's tattoos and she decides to get one that curls around her eye and runs down her jaw that is a red and gold and orange phoenix because she is _his phoenix_.

Years go by and she does not stay in one place though she still hears news from far away. She is in Llomerryn in a tavern when a woman sits down before her with light blue eyes and hair the color of night. She stares at the other woman and she feels like they have known each other for so long because they have both heard each other's life stories a thousand times but they have never met until now – the Champion and the Hero. The Champion is the spark in a barrel of Qunari exploding powder and she is the flames that devour and transforms the land. The Champion asks her what they will do and she smirks madly because now she is truly mad and insane and stares the Champion in the eye before she says:

_**We will set this world in flames.**_

_In the mourning, I'll rise._

_In the mourning, I'll let you die._

* * *

><p><strong>AN: This was kind of a weird style for me. The more mentally stable she is, the more clear and concrete the grammar and sentence structure is and as she dips into madness it's a little less clear. I dunno, I thought the human noble seemed so traumatizing but I haven't seen anyone attack that angle and after playing Dragon Age 2 I had to incorporate Hawke into it. I know there is no Awakening in this and I didn't cover everything that happened in the game but I only covered what I thought were important points in the psychological rollercoaster of Cousland. There are a few nods to songs in here which if you can catch, kudos. In the Mourning is by Paramore.<strong>

**Please please please review! I want to know if this was a good style or terrible idea and if I like it enough and I get enough of a response I might be persuaded to cover Hawke's story - though Hawke won't be quite as mad as this girl x3**


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